Blind
by karala.green
Summary: One-shot. AU. Rinoa sees Squall with another girl. With this situation comes a decision on what to do... afer an internal struggle, Rinoa makes up her mind.


_**Author's Note: **_I don't like having two separate accounts so I'm transferring everything here. It's not much but still… I wrote them, I can't leave them to rot like that (*grins).

This is not a carbon copy of the first version I posted in the inactive account (thing in the sky). The same plot though but thoughts are organized and I hope I improved grammar, spelling and such.

Enjoy! :)

_**First Posted: **_**07.27.06 **in my inactive account **_thing(dot)in(dot)the(dot)sky_**

_**Disclaimer**_: As usual, I don't own any of the characters from Final Fantasy VIII.

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**B L I N D**

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The darkness creeping to cover the sky was what Rinoa Heartilly was staring at one afternoon as she took a walk in the park after a long day at work. She was supposed to stay in the office overtime but decided not to.

Rinoa breathed deeply as the breeze blew her hair dramatically. It was a wonderful day (in terms of weather condition) but she wasn't able to enjoy it at all because of stress. In harmony with her usual _follow-my-heart_ self, she convinced herself that the job was not for her and stressing over it was not healthy.

_Maybe I could talk to Squall about that…_

Rinoa glanced up, hoping to see something soothing but what she saw wasn't soothing at all…

Squall Leonhart stood there with a look of blissful contentment as if everything he had in front of him was enough to sustain him in all aspects. Rinoa would have found this look very inviting – in a way that she would smile and kiss him passionately for it.

There was one problem with this scene: _Squall was not looking at her_.

Rinoa's mouth fell open as she watched the tall woman in front of Squall, her lover, tilt her head to kiss Squall with the passion that Rinoa imagined having if she was the one in the tall woman's place. She felt an invisible hand squeeze her heart as she watched her wrap her arms around Squall.

Rinoa held the front of her shirt and tried to stop the invisible hand from clutching her heart. In fact, it felt so bad that tears were rolling down her cheeks.

Rinoa turned around and ran away from that direction…

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When the wall clock showed that an hour was left before midnight, the main door clicked open.

"Rinoa?" Squall's voice came from the direction of the closed door.

It took a long time before Rinoa could say anything. Controlling her voice with all the energy she had left, "yes" was all she could mutter. She forced herself to stand up and made her way towards the living room.

Squall was beside the bookshelf. With his back turned to her, he rummaged through a stack of things and searched for something. At the sound of her going past the divider between the living room and the dining hall, Squall turned around to greet her. He slowly made his way towards her, searching her face from the distance until he was near enough to see every detail of her face.

"What took you so –" Squall stopped in mid-sentence and continued in a whisper: "You've been crying."

Rinoa shook her head and tried to stop the next batch of fresh tears from falling. Squall pulled her close and Rinoa could not find the strength to pull away.

Without thinking of it, she laid her head on his chest – feeling the warmth that his body radiated. She felt the security she always felt in his arms.

Rinoa felt a stab of pain and tears rolled down her cheeks freely.

_I fell too deep._

"What's wrong?" Squall asked soothingly, rubbing his arms up and down her back.

"Work," Rinoa lied with a falsely firm voice.

She realized that she didn't want Squall to leave her and she didn't want to leave him either.

"You should quit. I told you to relax," he said.

_It was my imagination._

_I have an overactive imagination._

Rinoa repeated the statements in her head until she almost convinced herself that it was true.

_He loves me._

_Me and no one else._

Rinoa continued to cry as she wrapped her arms around him. Squall tightened his arms around her in response.

_It hurts… so much._

_But… why can't I turn away from him?_

"I love you," Squall whispered.

Rinoa looked up at him, searching his eyes. It was filled with emotions but nothing showed betrayal.

"I love you," Rinoa whispered back, feeling the truth in what she said and hoped that his words were as real as it sounded to her ears.

_He loves me._

_I love him._

The scene involving Squall and another woman played in Rinoa's head. She hid her internal struggle by burying her face on his shoulder.

The tall woman kissed Squall.

_He betrayed you._

_No, that wasn't him._

_You saw him. You're not blind._

_I am blind. I am in love… with him._

Rinoa breathed deeply when her internal struggle silenced after her last thought. She could smell Squall's perfume and a faint scent of a woman's perfume and it wasn't hers.

She shut her eyes tight, thinking: _My imagination._

Rinoa numbed all of her senses – ignoring the pain of the possibility that the memory was not her imagination.

It was only her heart that will function whenever she was with him. She didn't want to care if Squall was seeing someone else. She loved him too much.

For her, every time she was with him, it was just her and him.

Him and her.

_No one else_…

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**_Author's Note: _**I originally dedicated this to my friend: **Loise** (_eLLe xxi_). It still is for her. **:)**

This is obviously **AU**. Thanks for reading, review, alright? :)

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_**Reviews for the old version of Blind:**_

**Sion 0083 **2006-12-29

Why Squall! LOL nice.

**kezia** (_anon_) 2006-10-02

ang galing... pero bitin.. hehe... at maiksi... :P aii sabi ko nga may sequel... hehe... im curious... yey... babasahin ko na ung susunod

**Cerulean Crystal **2006-09-22

nice. i will go and read that story now. thanks.

**Cerulean Crystal **2006-09-22

nice i like it. so sad. squall cheating on her. i wonder who that girl is. anyway please update soon. thanks.

**Nani mo Nai** 2006-09-06

great,..no i mean it. i love it...it's painful and nice. man it's cool, trust me. i love what Rino is going through...and for Squall to be a philanderer...who would have thought he was a player...hehehe...

**f u r o g u** 2006-08-08

hehe. that was random  
& nice  
poor rinoa tho' -cries-  
and yeah, love is truly blind.  
khekekes  
-going to check your stories. i see that you have KH stories too! xD-

by the way, do you have msn messenger?  
~ hana

**Arowen Half-Elven** 2006-08-07

BAD SQUALL! It's not like him to be unloyal. Poor Rinoa.

**eLLe xxi** 2006-08-01

aww... thanks anak. you really are good. haha! does the story really ends there? can you write more? :P LoL. luv yah. mwah!

**Raventhedarkgoddess** 2006-07-29

Bitter. Love really can make one into a blind fool, with a struggle in their own head, and this was captured well. Sometimes, the writing seemed to chop up a little, whereas in your other piece I read (Concealed, I believe?) the style was more definate, stronger.

Try to keep your words flowing and your writing will be great! You've got the emotions down, now you've just got to put everything together.

Oh, but I really did like the concept!

I'm sorry if I'm coming across as hard here... xD I tend to write these long reviews and have people get all mad at me...

Please don't be mad at me, I am trying to help! If you ever want any help with your writing or anything, PM or e-mail me. I love to help people, and I think you've got a lot of promise here as a writer.

With all due respect,  
Raventhedarkgoddess

**tw3akeddown** 2006-07-28

that's bittersweet...

heh.

**Kmsaum **2006-07-27

Ah, no flames needed. I like the strong emotion you have here. And it's a different take--usually Rinoa is the cheater.  
all in all, well done! sorry i havent more to say, i just...like this.  
~K~


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